The Rambler, Vol. II | Page 5

see a
year of confusion, a whole year, of cards in one room, and dancings in
another, here a feast, and there a masquerade, and plays, and coaches,
and hurries, and messages, and milliners, and raps at the door, and
visits, and frolicks, and new fashions, I shall not care what they do with
the rest of the time, nor whether they count it by the old style or the
new; for I am resolved to break loose from the nursery in the tumult,
and play my part among the rest; and it will be strange if I cannot get a
husband and a chariot in the year of confusion.
Cycle, who is neither so young nor so handsome as Starlight, very
gravely maintained, that all the perplexity may he avoided by leaping
over eleven days in the reckoning; and, indeed, if it should come only
to this, I think the new style is a delightful thing; for my mamma says I
shall go to court when I am sixteen, and if they can but contrive often
to leap over eleven days together, the months of restraint will soon be
at an end. It is strange, that with all the plots that have been laid against
time, they could never kill it by act of parliament before. Dear sir, if
you have any vote or interest, get them but for once to destroy eleven
months, and then I shall be as old as some married ladies. But this is
desired only if you think they will not comply with Mr. Starlight's
scheme; for nothing surely could please me like a year of confusion,
when I shall no longer be fixed this hour to my pen, and the next to my
needle, or wait at home for the dancing-master one day, and the next
for the musick-master; but run from ball to ball, and from drum to drum;
and spend all my time without tasks, and without account, and go out
without telling whither, and come home without regard to prescribed
hours, or family rules.
I am, sir,
Your humble servant,
PROPERANTIA.
MR. RAMBLER,
I was seized this morning with an unusual pensiveness, and, finding
that books only served to heighten it, took a ramble into the fields, in

hopes of relief and invigoration from the keenness of the air and
brightness of the sun.
As I wandered wrapped up in thought, my eyes were struck with the
hospital for the reception of deserted infants, which I surveyed with
pleasure, till, by a natural train of sentiment, I began to reflect on the
fate of the mothers. For to what shelter can they fly? Only to the arms
of their betrayer, which, perhaps, are now no longer open to receive
them; and then how quick must be the transition from deluded virtue to
shameless guilt, and from shameless guilt to hopeless wretchedness?
The anguish that I felt, left me no rest till I had, by your means,
addressed myself to the publick on behalf of those forlorn creatures, the
women of the town; whose misery here might satisfy the most rigorous
censor, and whose participation of our common nature might surely
induce us to endeavour, at least, their preservation from eternal
punishment.
These were all once, if not virtuous, at least innocent; and might still
have continued blameless and easy, but for the arts and insinuations of
those whose rank, fortune, or education, furnished them with means to
corrupt or to delude them. Let the libertine reflect a moment on the
situation of that woman, who, being forsaken by her betrayer, is
reduced to the necessity of turning prostitute for bread, and judge of the
enormity of his guilt by the evils which it produces.
It cannot be doubted but that numbers follow this dreadful course of
life, with shame, horrour, and regret; but where can they hope for
refuge: "_The world is not their friend, nor the world's law_." Their
sighs, and tears, and groans, are criminal in the eye of their tyrants, the
bully and the bawd, who fatten on their misery, and threaten them with
want or a gaol, if they show the least design of escaping from their
bondage.
"To wipe all tears from off all faces," is a task too hard for mortals; but
to alleviate misfortunes is often within the most limited power: yet the
opportunities which every day affords of relieving the most wretched of
human beings are overlooked and neglected, with equal disregard of
policy and goodness.
There are places, indeed, set apart, to which these unhappy creatures
may resort, when the diseases of incontinence seize upon them; but if
they obtain a cure, to what are they reduced? Either to return with the

small remains of beauty to their former guilt, or perish in